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First Satellite to Orbit Earth
The successful launch of the unmanned satellite Sputnik I by the Soviet Union in October 1957 shocks and frightens many Americans. As the tiny satellite orbited the earth, Americans reacted with dismay that the Soviets could have gotten so far ahead of the supposedly technologically superior United States. -
The first animal
The Soviet Union launches the first animal into space—a dog name Laika—aboard the Sputnik 2 spacecraft. Laika, part Siberian husky, lived as a stray on the Moscow streets before being enlisted into the Soviet space program. Laika survived for several days as a passenger in the USSR's second artificial Earth satellite, kept alive by a sophisticated life-support system. Electrodes attached to her body provided scientists on the ground with important information about biological effects of space. -
First Human in Space
April 12 was already a huge day in space history twenty years before the launch of the first shuttle mission. On that day in 1961, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin (left, on the way to the launch pad) became the first human in space, making a 108-minute orbital flight in his Vostok 1 spacecraft. Newspapers like The Huntsville Times (right) trumpeted Gagarin's accomplishment. -
The First American in Space
Alan Shepard became the first American in space when the Freedom 7 spacecraft blasted off from Florida on May 5, 1961. Ten years later, Shepard would leave Earth's atmosphere again to become the fifth man to walk on the moon — and the first one to play golf there. -
The Friendship Seven
John H. Glenn, Jr. was placed into space craft 13 to orbit the earth and observe his reactions to the space environment and safely return him to earth to a point where he could be readily found. -
First Women in Space
On June 16, 1963, aboard Vostok 6, Soviet Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova becomes the first woman to travel into space. After 48 orbits and 71 hours, she returned to earth, having spent more time in space than all U.S. astronauts combined to that date. -
First Space Walk
Alexei Leonov, His walk in space was originally to have taken place on the Vostok 11 mission, but this was cancelled, and the historic event happened on the Voskhod 2 flight instead. He was outside the spacecraft for 12 minutes and nine seconds on 18 March 1965, connected to the craft by a 5.35-meter tether. -
First Space Walk
Alexei Leonov, was born in the Soviet Union on May 30, 1934. He was one of the twenty Soviet Air Force Pilots to be chosen for the first cosmonaut group. Originally, his historic walk was supposed to have happened on the Vostok 11 mission, but as that was cancelled; it was later performed on the Voskhod 2 mission instead. After eighteen long months of training for the event, Leonov was ready to become the first person to walk in space -
First Deaths in Space
Deaths- Gus Grissom, Edward White II, Roger Chaffee
NASA's Apollo 1 mission, the cabin was filled with pure oxygen as part of its environmental control system. An electrical fault sparked a flash fire in the cabin. The fire spread quickly in the pure oxygen atmosphere, suffocating all three Apollo 1 crew members through smoke inhalation -
First Moon Landing
In 1969, as part of the Apollo 11 mission, Neil Armstrong became the very first to walk on the moon, followed only minutes later by Buzz Aldrin. Their accomplishment placed the United States ahead of the Soviets in the Space Race and gave people around the world the hope of future space exploration. -
First Spce Rescue
On Apollo 13 and oxagen tank exploded.Thanks to the help from Mission Control, crew Jim Lovell, Fred Haise, and John Swigert return to Earth safely four days later. -
First Space Station
The first space station was Salyut 1 lounched by the Soviet Union. -
STS-7
STS-7 was NASA's seventh Space Shuttle mission, and the second mission for the Space Shuttle Challenger. -
First American Women in Space
On June 18, 1983, Sally Ride became the first American woman to fly in space when the space shuttle Challenger launched on mission STS-7. -
First Civilian Death
Svetlana Savitskaya becomes the first woman to do a space walk. With her partner, Vladimir Dzhanibekov, she conducts welding experiments for over three hours outside the Soviet space station Salyut 7. -
First Year in Space
Musa Manarov and Vladimir Titov complete 366 days on the Russian space station, Mir. This record is broken on March 22, 1995, when cosmonaut Valery Poyakov returns to Earth after spending 437 days and 18 hours (1.19 years) in orbit. -
First space telescope
The crew of space shuttle mission STS-31 deploy the Hubble Space Telescope. Soon thereafter, the Hubble's primary mirror is found to be damaged. In December 1993, the crew of space shuttle STS-61 corrects the problem during space walks watched live on television by millions of people. -
First Spacecraft to Leave the Solar System
Voyager 1 is a 722-kilogram (1,592 lb) space probe launched by NASA on September 5, 1977 to study the outer Solar System. Operating for 36 years, 6 months and 6 days as of 11 March 2014, the spacecraft communicates with the Deep Space Network to receive routine commands and return data. At a distance of about 127.13 AU (1.902×1010 km) from the Earth as of 11 March 2014,[3][4] it is the farthest human-made object from Earth.[5] -
First International Space Station
The International Space Station (ISS) is a space station, or a habitable artificial satellite in low Earth orbit. It is a modular structure whose first component was launched in 1998.[7] Now the largest artificial body in orbit, it can often be seen at the appropriate time with the naked eye from Earth -
First American to Spend 6 Monthst in Space
Lucid logged more than 223 days in space, and from August 1991 to June 2007, held the record for the most days in orbit by any woman in the world
